A Painting of The Country of Hearts
by Psycho-FTW
Summary: Once upon a time, there was a girl who stumbled upon a painting... (A.U. inspired slightly by Ib) *I'm sorry! I put the chapters in the wrong order! I have realized this and just fixed it! Again, I'm sorry!*
1. Prologue

**A/N: I'm back~! This story idea just came to me today, so I thought, 'Why not?'. This story is kind of based off of the video game, 'Ib', but not so much it could be considered a crossover. This story will be updated every Wednesday (Unless there's an emergency).**

**Prolouge**

_Once upon a time, there was a girl. This girl was a very strange girl, whom was always alone. Her family abused her, she wasn't allowed to go to school, and she was alone in her very lonely existence._

_One day, however, she decided to run away from her when her family was gone. And run she did._

_She ran for days, and, after a week, her family realized she was gone. After this realization, they went to look for her, for who else were they to lash out their anger upon?_

_But the girl had hidden in a place where they coudn't find her no matter how hard they tried. The girl, however, came out of hiding after a few months. When the family saw her, they immediately brought her back to their home._

_Once the family had her home, they beat her and demanded her to tell them where she had disappeared to. She replied honestly, speaking of adventures where she fell into a painting, and of a world where no one wished for her to leave. Her family told her she must be mad and beat her again. They then demanded that she tell the truth._

_With nothing else to do, she reached into the small bag of her belongings and pulled out a worn map, with pictures on the back of many different people. Some had faces, some did not. Some had animal ears, others didn't. Some were eyepatches, yet the other people did not._

_When the family saw this, they worried, for no one was supposed to know about the girl._

_So, the family took the map and pictures away, an, after they beat the girl thrice more, went away from her._

_The girl, having lost her prized possession, proceeded to cry and weep, and fell into a great despair for many years. Though she moved on with her life, she never went a day without yearning for her precious map back._

_After many years, the wicked family died, leaving only the girl on she saw this, she retrieved her map from the place her family had hidden it, and, when she saw the map and the pictures of people, she wept with joy, so happy to be reunited with her prize possession..._

...I think I'm a bit ahead of myself. You see, I'm not here to tell you of 'happy ever afters' and of 'how the wicked will not stand.' Oh no, that's not my job. You see, it's someone else's job to tell you the story of how the girl was reunited with her map. My job is to tell you how she stumbled across it and why it was so dear to her. Yes, this is the story of a runaway child...

_**And it doesn't begin with 'Once upon a time'**_.


	2. Heart Medicine'

**The Beginning: The Cave of Painting**

_The girl ran and ran, until she tired, and, when she had realized she had ran straight into a cave with peculiar paintings lining the walls..._

"Where could I possibly be?" Saharey asked herself as she walked slowly, beginning to work her way down the cave's length. She was surprised to have stumbled upon such a trove of artwork, especially in a deserted place like this.

She stopped in front of a dully colored painting to her left.

"The Black-Chested White Rabbit...," Saharey murmured quietly. The painting depicted a boy with bright white rabbit ears who seemed a year or two older then her, and he was pointing a gun straight out in front of him. From the way it was painted, it almost looked like the boy was glaring at him, the way his ashen locks fell over his eyes. And the most peculiar thing was that the boy had a large black clock painted in the middle of his chest. "How very strange..."

Saharey continued to walk slowly, admiring the many pictures that lined the walls, whether they be of person or object or thing. As she walked, pictures of clocks and castles and amusement parks filled her sight.

"Amazing," she mused to herself. "Why aren't these paintings where many can see them?"

She kept her slow pace as she observed each painting...that is, until she heard a slightly deep voice from behind her.

'Saharey...Saharey...come and play~...'

Saharey whirled around to see who was there.

"Hello?" she called out. She realized no one was there. "Silly me, I must have been mistaken..."

She then resumed walking down the cave's length, moving a bit more swiftly now. She caught glimpses of the paintings that surrounded her, and she noticed they seemed to be getting...darker, to say the least. Hands with bloody clocks in them, people with gaping black holes for eyes, wars being waged in the most brutal of matters.

Then, eventually, the paintings started becoming scarcer and scarcer, until they finally disappeared. And, at that point, Saharey had reached the end of the tunnel.

A lone painting was placed against the tall, curved back of the cave, it's golden frame glistening. It revealed a hole in a grass green field, and, above the hole, was a pink glass vial with a heart cap. There was a larger caption beneath this picture as well.

'Heart Medicine,' the caption read. 'Drink it, and you will go to the place you wish to be most.'

"That's...interesting," Saharey muttered to herself.

A bright light suddenly blinded her and she fell backwards onto the stone ground. When the light died down, she noticed that the frame of the painting had disappeared. The grass in the painting seemed to sway, as though an invisible wind was pushing it lightly. And, sitting next to the hole, holding the heart medicine, sat the white rabbit from the earlier painting.

Saharey stood back up, dusting herself off as she stood. She looked at the painting and noticed the change.

"What..?" Saharey mused. "He wasn't there before!"

She slowly lifted a hand to touch the painting, but before she could...

...a white gloved hand reached out, grabbed her wrist, and pulled her, head first, into the painting.

_And so began her journey..._


	3. Black Chested White Rabbit

**The First Painting: The Black-Chested White Rabbit**

_The girl was shocked to find that she had actually be pulled into the painting. But, she had to admit, it was a lot better than being pulled by the hair to be punished..._

"!" Saharey looked around in suprise at her new surroundings. She sat in a field, with emerald green grass as far as she could see. She could feel a light breeze in the air, and she felt as though she had seen this place before...

...but that was because she had.

"What?" she asked as she stood up, not at all expecting an answer.

"Are you alright, my dear, or are you hurt, as I feared?" a slightly deep voice called out from behind her.

Saharey turned around slowly to see whom was speaking to her.

She gasped quietly as she took in the rabbit boy from the painting.

"Y-you're..." she stuttered. Why, she thought, he can't possibly be...

He stared at her in confusion.

"What is wrong?" he asked her.

"You look just like..."

_**Flashback**_

_"You ugly, horrible b*tch! You didn't prepare it right!" she yelled as her hand made a loud 'Crack' as it made contact with her young daughter's face._

_The girl whimpered as she fell onto her behind with a 'Thud', the pain spreading quickly throughout her face._

_"I'm sorry!" Saharey said softly to her mother as she stood, getting back up off the ground. She turned and began walking back to the kitchen to make her mother a new cake, but she ran into someone first._

_"Let me guess..." he growled out venomously. "...you f*cked something up again, didn't you?"_

_Saharey's eyes widened in fear as she looked up at the man she called, 'Father'._

_"N-No..." she said, looking into his violent, violet-red eyes which were hidden behind his golden-framed glasses._

_He kicked her leg so she collapsed to the floor._

_"I don't accept lying wh*res in my family," he said threateningly, his bleach-blonde locks falling over his eyes, his hand reaching towards the whip on the table._

_"N-n-no..." Saharey choked out._

_"You poor f*cking girl..." her mother said callously. "...poor f*cking girl, my *ss."_

_Saharey closed her eyes as she could tell the whip was about to make contact and-_

"-arey!" the rabbit-eared boy called worriedly as he placed a hand on Saharey's shoulder.

Saharey flinched. How was she to deal with a boy who looked almost identical to her abusive father?


	4. Mad Adder and Co

**Inside: The Mad Adder and Co.**

Saharey stared at the rabbit-eared boy fearfully. She was scared out of her wits, to say the least. Why was her father here? She thought. I just ran from him! How did he find me so soon?!

And with that thought, she took off running toward the forest a distance away from the rabbit boy.

The boy followed her. "Wait!" he called from behind her. "Don't go there! That's a bad place!"

Saharey was in the forest before the boy could even get close to her.

"...Crap! It's against the rules for me to go there! I hope the Adder doesn't find her..." the boy muttered as he began to walk towards his home in the opposite direction of the forest.

"Pardon?" A black-haired boy with an elegant top hat covering his scaled face asked his spy to make sure he heard correctly.

The sna- I mean spy, simply hissed in response.

The boy snarled angrily and slammed his tea cup down on the table.

"How many times have I told you to simply kill intruders unless they have a large amount of cash with them?" the boy sighed as he rubbed his temples as the spy hissed response.

"That's right. So tell me, what's so hard about this?" the boy asked.

The snake hissed loudly in response.

The boy's eyes widen in surprise before an evil grin forms on his face.

"An Outsider? Why didn't you say that from the beginning? Tell the twins that I'll require their services."

"'Go no farther unless you wish for death'...hm..." Saharey frowned as she read the crudely written note hammered into the tree. "I don't like the sound of this..."

"Found her!" called a yound boy's voice from behind her. She frowned. What now...?

"Contrariwise, I believe I saw her first brother!" stated a nearly identical voice.

She turned to find to boys behind her with axes pointing dangerously close to her heart. One of the axes looked as though frost was coating it, and was held by a black haired boy with neon blue eyes and clothes to match. The other boy had a red hot ax in his hands, with eyes and clothes to match. Besides the weapon and clothing differences, the were practically identical.

"...hi?" Saharey asked unsurely as she stared at the two boys pointing dangerous, deadly weapons at her.

The boys seemed quite surprised and lowered their weapons slightly.

"'Hi?'" the blue boy said. Saharey now noticed how the air was colder when this one spoke. "It's hard to believe that her last words are going to be 'hi'!"

"Contraiwise," the red one began, the air heating up again. "I believe it is reasonable considering she does not know who we are."

"Pardon me, but could you at least tell me where I'm at before you kill me?" Saharey asked politely.

"Ah, you are in the Hatter's forest!" the red one explained.

"Funny how she doesn't seem to mind getting killed..." The blue one stated.

"May I also know my killer's names?" Saharey said.

"I'm Dee" said the blue one.

"I'm Dum" said the red one.

"I see. Well then, now that I know the answers to my questions, you can kill me now."

The boys looked at each other. Why didn't she seem scared of dying?

**A.N.- I'm back! I am so freaking sorry! My computer broke, we moved to Atlanta, my dad got so sick we couldn't be in the same house as him for about a month and a half, I was in a play, and I had to work a graduation! SO. 0OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

**Sorry! (****Do you see the zero? *shot*)**** Besides that, my life has been pretty normal and sucky, so I will try to work on getting this back on schedule now that it's summer! Please don't kill me for extreme lateness!**

**-Fathom, A.K.A. Psycho-FTW**


End file.
